Has Lex Finally Found His Voice?

Yesterday I was in the bathroom with Lex
and I asked him to do something, to which he immediately responded: “sure Mum,”
and then went on to say something that told me he’d understood exactly what I
said. I wish I could remember the exact exchange, but I was so flummoxed at
being understood, what we actually said to each other went out of the window immediately. The
thing I CAN remember about this moment, however, is the feeling of being truly
and utterly elated – I WAS UNDERSTOOD BY LEX! I should mention that this moment
has been a long time coming – six years to be exact.

Lex turned six on November the 12th
and after being diagnosed with compressed ear canals (at age four), he had grommets
inserted, and his tonsils and adenoids removed - that was two years ago. Since that day,
we’ve been waiting for him to cross a ‘line’ - a line where both expressive and
receptive language is age appropriate, and it has been excruciatingly painful
waiting for this to happen. The worst thing we’ve dealt with is our own
expectations - because EVERYONE said within 12 months he’ll be caught up - he’ll
just “get it.” Well he didn’t “just get it” and we’ve spent thousands of
dollars trying to work out how to help him get it, and you know what has helped
him the most? Spending the last few months full time with his chatty pants
brother! Yep, Mr. Charmer Jax has been the answer to our challenge all along,
but it has only been in the last few months that they have spent their days together
full-time. Oh they’ve shitted each other to tears, beaten the crap out of each
other, infuriated each other, etc, etc, etc during this time... but we finally
found our magic potion – The Jaxster.

I knew something special was happening with
Lex in the last month or so, because every single time he’s about to go into an
intellectual developmental spurt (usually coinciding with a physical growth
spurt) he turns into a TURD. Belligerence is an understatement. However, in the
“good-‘ol-days” his belligerence was always behaviour-lead, which often left
Steve and I scratching our heads because the behaviours didn’t make any sense
to our logical brains. The big difference with this last spurt has been verbal –
for the first time, Lex has become all mouth and attitude: “no you do it” or “oh
my god, can you believe that?” or “I’m not doing that” or “you’re not listening
Daddy, I’m very angry with you.” I could go on.

Jax, our magic potion

But he’s also saying some really great
stuff, like when his Dad asks him a question, he’ll respond: “Daddy I’m
thinking.” In fact, yesterday he asked me three times: “Mummy what are you
thinking about?” It’s always an interesting question that, because my brain is
never dormant, and him understanding the thinking process and being interested
in what another is pondering – well that alone tells me we’ve come a long long
way.

But this has not been an easy road for any
of us to travel. Just yesterday – before my “moment” with Lex - we were wandering
through Bishan Park in Singapore, and Steve and I were talking about lots of
stuff. However, one of the things we were talking about is how excruciatingly
difficult it has been raising a speech delayed child. Parents who have kids with
normal speech can never know how difficult it is having a child that doesn’t understand
anything you say. We’ve also found other parents have found it difficult to
understand why we’re not stricter or trying to sort out certain behaviours - but
it’s hard to explain to someone with a speaking child the reasons for our more relaxed
approach to things like discipline. We just had to recognise that there’s no
point fighting the battles we can’t win. It’s been HARD, but we’ve always
believed in our little lad, and finally, finally, finally it seems that Lex has
found his voice.

Oh shit, got tears in my eyes writing that.

To the other parents out there with speech
delayed kids, especially those of you I’ve never met but have read and
responded to my blogs (thank you for that, it means the world to me) – I hope
this gives you hope. Lex took a lot longer than most kids to get past his
hurdles, but my observations on this are:

No one knows when kids start being hearing challenged, so no one actually knows how far behind they are by the time the physical problem is fixed. Try not to put any time expectations on your child’s development if you can. That's been a big lesson for us

Lex is incredibly self conscious and he gets very easily embarrassed when he makes a fool of himself in front of people. Therefore the act of speaking for him has been excruciatingly difficult because he’s felt so embarrassed. If your kid is self-conscious, it might be worth keeping in mind

Bad behaviour or crazy behaviour or excessive oral behaviour are also linked to speech delayed kids and none of these behaviours necessarily indicate the child is autistic, or anything else. Try and resist the pressure to get your kids diagnosed by people because it makes their life easier – please? Especially if you know in your heart of hearts that you are dealing with a speech issue only. Address that first before looking at other things

Fighting through your child’s speech delay challenges can be pretty straight forward or intensely challenging, impacting every aspect of your life. We’re in the latter category so just know there are people out there who understand your pain – it’s certainly meant a lot to me knowing I’m not alone

We found we can’t force Lex to do anything he doesn’t want to do – because he’s bloody stubborn like his Mother. Therefore, I think a lot of the solutions we’ve tried to follow just haven’t interested him. So keep exploring your options if progress isn’t happening, and if there’s a sibling with a great command of language (even a younger one in our case) perhaps see if that’s your magic potion too?

But the most important lesson is never give up – your little speech delayed prince or princess needs your belief in them. Any parent going through this will completely understand one thing – when the pressure from outside mounts, keeping your faith in your child is the hardest thing in the world – even I was on rocky shores sometimes, and I’m as stubborn as they bloody come...

Two brothers - they teach each other

With that, all I’d like to say right now is
hooray Lex - you bloody beauty!! I’ve been waiting to write this blog for a very
long time, and even though we’ve still got a long road ahead of us, you’ve
crossed that line at last. I love ya buddy and I’m so proud of who you are. Yours, without the bollocksAndrea

I grew up in country Australia, went to university in Melbourne studying music and ancient history, joined the Australian Army as a musician, entered the world of public relations, and then decided to head off around the world. That was 1995 and I'm still going, having lived in London, Boston, NYC, Thailand and Singapore - with a couple of short trips back to Australia in between. Singapore-based now, with an adorable husband and two rambunctious sons, my professional background is communication strategy and content marketying, with a focus on business and creative writing. My passion is people from all walks of life, and the amazing diversity of this extraordinary planet. I reckon life is pretty great, even though it can be crap sometimes too. I also blog extensively, with three blogs - my personal blog Without the Bollocks where I talk about life, my professional blog SAJE focused on all things communication, and a kids adventure blog for Singapore. Hey what can I say, I need to write!